Puget Sound Low Tide Calendar 2026: The Best Daylight Lows of Summer

Puget Sound's last big run of 2026 is under way: August 8–13, six straight daylight windows at Seattle (NOAA station 9447130) and Port Townsend (9444900). The weekend day is Sunday, August 9 — −1.91 ft MLLW at 8:29 AM in Seattle (score 98) and −2.05 ft at 7:38 AM in Port Townsend (a flat 100) — and the deepest water comes Tuesday, August 11, at −2.63 ft. After Thursday the 13th, the deepest daylight low left in 2026 at either station is −1.11 ft.

What's left in 2026? This week, mostly.

Every remaining daylight window at Seattle deeper than −1.1 ft falls between August 8 and August 13 (computed 2026-08-08 from NOAA station 9447130 predictions):

Port Townsend runs the same six mornings roughly 50 minutes earlier and a shade deeper on the weekend: Sunday, August 9 is −2.05 ft at 7:38 AM (window 5:00–10:50 AM, score 100), with the run peaking at −2.42 ft on Tuesday, August 11, at 9:24 AM. Once this run ends, the deepest daylight low left in 2026 is −1.02 ft (Seattle, Tuesday, September 8); at Port Townsend it's −1.11 ft on Labor Day, September 7.

When were the deepest daylight lows of 2026?

One run in mid-July did most of the work. Seattle's eight deepest daylight lows of the year fell within two clusters — July 12–16, now in the record books, and the August 10–12 stretch that is here now:

Computed 2026-07-03 from NOAA station 9447130 predictions.

Port Townsend (NOAA station 9444900) ran the same script 53 to 56 minutes earlier: its deepest daylight low of the year was −3.48 ft on Tuesday, July 14, at 10:25 AM, with −3.48 ft on the 13th, −3.10 ft on the 15th, and −3.10 ft on Sunday the 12th.

Notice the drift in the table. Seattle's low stepped from 9:40 AM on July 12 to 10:31, 11:20, 12:08, then 12:55 by July 16 — about 47 to 51 minutes later each day. The August run above drifts the same way, its low arriving roughly 45 minutes to an hour later each day. That drift is the villain of the next section.

How many of the deepest lows landed on a weekend?

Count the weekday column above: two Mondays, two Tuesdays, two Wednesdays, one Thursday, one Sunday. That's 1 weekend day out of 8, or 12.5%. Run the same count on Port Townsend's four deepest daylight lows (July 14, 13, 15, 12) and you get the same lone Sunday: 1 of 4.

This isn't bad luck; it's arithmetic. Deep lows arrive in runs of four or five consecutive days around a new or full moon, and each day's low lands roughly 50 minutes later than the last. A run occupies whatever stretch of the week it occupies — and five consecutive days can touch at most two weekend days, usually fewer. In 2026 the big July run opens on a Sunday and spends its deepest three days on Monday through Wednesday.

Here's the full 2026 weekend-and-holiday list — the July dates have now passed, which leaves Sunday, August 9, and Labor Day:

Computed 2026-07-03 from NOAA station 9447130 and 9444900 predictions; Labor Day 2026 falls on Monday, September 7.

All four score 77 or better on our 0–100 window scale; July 11 and 12 scored a flat 100 at both stations. Of what remains, if your calendar is flexible enough for exactly one weekday, take Tuesday, August 11 — its −2.63 ft low buys you 0.72 ft more exposed beach than Sunday the 9th.

What does the rest of 2026 look like, month by month?

The tide keeps producing lows below +1 ft all year — roughly 19 to 23 per month at both stations. What collapses after summer is daylight:

Computed 2026-07-03 from NOAA station 9447130 and 9444900 predictions.

Sum the Seattle columns: 51 daylight windows from July through December, against 126 lows below +1 ft in the same span — about 40%. And 31 of the 37 daylight minus tides (84%) are packed into July and August. November and December contribute 42 sub-+1-ft lows between them and not one daylight window; October's best candidate (October 5, a +0.10 ft low at 6:42 AM) scores 22 and sits in our "Skip" band. The year heatmap makes this cliff easy to see at a glance.

Seattle or Port Townsend?

Same moon, different clock. Port Townsend's lows run about 51 minutes ahead of Seattle's — 7:38 AM versus 8:29 AM on Sunday, August 9 — and its windows stretch longer: on Monday, August 10, Port Townsend gets 346 minutes of daylight window against Seattle's 275, and 340 versus 270 on Tuesday the 11th. Early risers and photographers get more room to work up north.

Seattle's advantage is access. The station's reference beaches — Alki Beach, Constellation Park, and Golden Gardens — sit inside the city, and recent observations within 5 km of the station include 12 sightings of Monterey dorids and 11 of horned nudibranchs in the last 60 days (station data refreshed 2026-08-08). Full date lists live on the Seattle station page and the Port Townsend station page; the August 2026 calendar for Seattle has every window of this week's run, day by day.

How do you work a window?

Use the arrive-by time, not the low time. For Seattle's window this Sunday, August 9, that's 7:29 AM — an hour before the 8:29 AM low. The National Park Service's tidepooling guidance says to be at the tidepools "at least an hour before low tide" so you can explore while the water is still receding, and to head back "no later than an hour after the tide has begun to rise." NPS also warns that the route out crosses slippery, algae-covered rock and pools a foot or more deep, so wear shoes that grip when wet.

Planning a trip around one of these runs rather than a single day? The trip picker finds the multi-day stretches — it will point you at August 8–13 without being asked. And if you want to check any number in this article, the methodology page documents how windows and scores are computed from NOAA's harmonic predictions.

One of eight. Book the Sunday, or book the day off.